Why does the moon follow us when we drive?
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When we speed along a road, we notice that everything moves past us. Trees, houses, the road, fences – all fly past us in the opposite direction. We naturally expect the moon also to be flying past us. When this does not happen, we have the sensation that it is “following” us. It happens because the distance of the moon from the earth is quite great. So as we move along, the angle at which we see the moon hardly changes. In fact, we could go along a straight path for miles and the angle at which we could see the moon would still be basically the same.
The moon seems like it’s following us when we’re in a car because it’s really far away, and that tricks our eyes! Here’s how it works:
Imagine you’re driving, and you see a tree or a building near the road. As you move, those things seem to “whiz” past you really fast. But the moon is so far away—about 238,900 miles from Earth! Because of that huge distance, even when you drive a long way, the moon barely changes position in the sky. So instead of zooming past, it seems to stay in the same spot and “follow” you.
You can try this with a friend: hold up your thumb in front of your face and close one eye. Move your thumb left or right, and you’ll see it looks like it moves a lot! But if you hold your thumb far away from you, it doesn’t seem to move as much. The moon is like that, but even farther—so it looks like it’s just drifting along with you.
So, really, the moon isn’t following you—it just seems like it is because it’s so far away that it doesn’t move much in the sky as you drive!
